Write-Up

Lymington Festive Stadium Racing - Hampshire, UK, 15th Dec

This seasons annual Lymington Town SC Festive RS Aero Stadium Racing was one of the largest ever with 18 entries signed up. Conditions were perfect with a medium breeze, mild temps and we received water for Christmas with a super high tide to race on!

Racing was held with one start and all in RS Aero 7s except for one RS Aero 6 who took on the challenge against the 7s.
Chief RO Liam Willis explained the course and format at the briefing - lots of short legs with a couple of beats each lap and a downwind start! Intermitantly the RRS42 (propulsion) relaxation flag would be hoisted to keep everyone on their toes and ensure they stayed warm! The safety/mark rib was promoted to Jury duty to catch anyone over zealous enough to pump or rock outside the permitted moments. Six 'quick fire' races were held with quick turnarounds with a 'fun' and 'no collisions!' ethos. The pontoon spectator hecklers were kept amused by the on the water antics and fueled the racers in the alongside pontoon pitstop lane with tipples and mince pies between races. Everyone enjoyed the late season workout, which was an excellent way to develop close quarter race skills and boat handling. 

Hot out of the blocks in Race 1 was Hugh Styles who built up a comanding lead. In Race 2 Peter Barton nipped inside at the windward mark to go on to take that race. The wind increased with occasional planing in the gusts and Race 3 went to Cameron Bignold-Kyles who was steadily putting together a solid series. Peter overtook Mark Ripley for the win in Race 4, but Mark answered with a win in Race 5. With a high scoring no discard series and consistency vital all was still open going into the final race and the RO had reversed the course for some good variety. Cameron took the win to make up ground on his closest competitors.

After a 10:00 start we were all back in the clubhouse in good time for lunch and awards. No one was quite sure who might have come out on top with plenty of high scores, but once the computer had done its stuff there was a tie for first place between Cameron and Peter, with Cameron on top. Sailwave may have strangely not split the tie break as per RRS this time, but in fairness we had also not announced 'no discards' at the instructions briefing (that is usual for this established event) and with a discard Cameron would have taken the win. First RS Aero 6 was Ava Francis who did a great job keeping up with the RS Aero 7s. Top Christmas fancy dress went to Alex Gibson, more emphasis from everyone on this next year please!

Thanks to all the volunteers for making this fun event possible and to Rooster for their array of prizes.

Results